Capitalist systems function less well without state protection of investors, lenders, and companies against monopoly, deception, and fraud.
The Keynesian belief that 'demand' is always at the root of underemployment and slow growth is a fallacy.
In the 1960s, and stretching back to the 1930s, it was felt by many economists that easy money is a reliable way to increase employment.
Statistical studies are all over the lot about the pluses and minuses of raising the minimum wage.
I'm old enough to remember in the 1930s and the 1940s when thrift, frugality, was considered an important virtue.
My God, I don't know anyone who likes to accumulate their wealth more than the Europeans.
I could try to incorporate or reflect in my models what it is that an employee, manager, or entrepreneur does: to recognize that most are engaged in their work, form expectations and evolve beliefs, solve problems, and have ideas. Trying to put these people into economic models became my project.
In societies where one sees a higher prevalence of 'modern values' - individualism, vitalism and self-expression - there's also higher reported job satisfaction.
I would like to see people dreaming of striking out on their own into some other country or their own, wherever they feel the action is, in the hope of an exciting and rewarding career.
What brought mass innovation to a nation was not scientific advances - its own or others' - but 'economic dynamism': the desire and the space to innovate.
